Oct 4 2013:
How can you decide that The Decision 'is' good or bad ?
Yaa, but you can decide that decision 'was' good or bad ?

... There is a big difference Janet. At the time of taking decision you are not aware of its consequences, only your perception leads to that. Thats why you can't judge any decision as a good or bad at the time of making. In that situation, decision takes place. :)

Oct 4 2013:
There is no bad decision at all. It is only by our perception we judging a decision is bad or not. I would encourage anyone to try,to make decisions, it is through making decisions we grow. Dont be afraid of making mistakes.

Oct 3 2013:
In the realm of conscious awareness there is no such an act as making no decision at all. Doing nothing requires a decision. You are asking if failing to select and act upon a course of action chosen from all the available known courses of action is the least appropriate choice one can make? If one viable course of action is to do nothing and see what happens then choosing that course would not be a bad decision. However, sometimes doing nothing is not a rational, viable choice. In such cases one must choose to take action. For example, if the outcome of deliberate inaction is known to be not good and best avoided, then reason and rationality demand that one must take action and do something.

Oct 2 2013:
It sounds like this is an assignment for school. In that case, it is probably best to come up with your own ideas! You might start with some decisions you have made that you think were not good. What if you had not acted at all?

Another thing you could do is pose hypothetical situations to yourself. Maybe there is a medical emergency or a conflict between friends. Are there situations in which you would be better off standing on the sidelines and deferring to someone present who you know could intervene more effectively? But perhaps you would consider the decision not to act yourself as a decision?

If you really want to use other people's thinking for this, you will find that there are lots and lots of sample essays online on this commonly asked essay question.

Oct 6 2013:
I'm afraid I'll have to challenge many of the above. No decision does exist. And bad decision may not be so retrospective. Let me propose an example:

You are sitting a true/false exam. You know there is no negative marking. You got stuck on one question and time is running out.

Situation 1: You had attempted every question the best you could, but you didn't realise time's up so you left some questions blank.-----------------this is 'no decision'.

Situation 2: You do realise time is running out, but decided to leave the remainder of the questions blank anyway--------------------this is a 'bad decision' (because if you'd just made random guesses you would have got 50% of the marks on the remainder questions)

Both will have the same consequences- i.e. 'leaving the remainder quesions blank', but the decisions were very different.

Oct 5 2013:
Depends on what is at risk and the consequences associated with a both a bad decision and no decision. It also depends on your comfort with accepting the risk of a wrong decision. Some decisions have no clear right or wrong, just what is right for you.

Important decisions might be best made after gathering evidence about different options, considering both the potential benefits and consequences relative to that is at risk.

For example, a decision about wearing red or blue socks carries is not very significant, unless perhaps you are a model in New York representing a designer. However, making no decision and not wearing socks might blister your feet. Making no decision, or spending too much time deciding, might make you late for the bus and school, so the consequences of inaction here are pretty high.

A bigger decision is who do I marry? How much time do you need to decide? Will he find someone else while I wait? Is she the one I want to spend my life with? Am I ready for marriage? These are big decisions and what is right for you might not be right for another person.

Perhaps you want to buy a house, invest in some stock, or loan someone money? How much are you risking relative to what you have (or will have if borrowing for a house)? Is it a good investment? Does it meet my needs?

1) there is no such thing as no decision or no action. itself is decision or action.
-I would think and make decision
2) bad decision - it generally up to you to decide later if action or decision (OUTCOME) was bad. even if it bad, you learn from it. it could be bad, however you learn from it , it could come good if use it wisely. life learns.
-ultimately there is no bad or good outcome, it up to you to make, use, decide it is bad or good outcome.
-I would go for outcome that is easily perceived as positive, good. to do that you might need think or use previous experience to know which action is best.
3) If new experience or situation, first time it happen to you. gather more data or ask people you are more experience than you. think logically, creative to come up with the right decision.
4) If little or no time to decision, use your instinct, choice one that is positive, fun, exciting.
-whichever decision or action I take, I am going to make it fun, positive, exciting outcome for me.
-e.g. it journey. it not A, B, C,D. it only in exam you get that. for that u need study or guess.

Life is full of decision or no decision, it journey you take. you can spend time thinking about right course of direction. most time you learn from right result and bad result. you correct the course and aim for better outcome. -better know the outcome you want and steer the action, decision to that course.

Oct 3 2013:
Yes. You cannot learn from not making a decision. There is no outcome or result to observe if you don't make a decision and decide to do nothing. Making any decision, good or bad, can be learned from. Most people learn more from bad decisions because it sticks with them for a longer time (so they think/reflect on it more) and you can improve and learn from a bad decision more than from a good decision.

Would you like some examples? Almost any situation works, but I can come up with some if you want.

Oct 3 2013:
It depends on the situation.
I'd say the most crucial factor is how much time you've got to make said decision. In emergencies for example, even a bad reaction may be preferable to no reaction at all.

There's no universal answer for this sort of thing, the question is much to vague for that.

What do you mean by "bad decision?" Ultimately it depends on the situation in which it occurs. Of course, in most situations making no decision at all would take precedence over making a bad decision.
An example of this is when one could be learning to sky dive. Although he doesn't believe he is ready, he jumps. This is a bad decision, which may lead to being unable to make any more decisions. However, if he didn't jump, he still has time to review what he has learned and make better decisions.

However, and example of where making a bad decision over making no decision is when there is a student talking a test. Multiple choice he guesses; he has a better chance of getting it right than none at all. Although this is a minor example, there are many others that could be blown up to a scale where it really does affect people.

All in all, there is no right answer to this question. It depends on the person and the situation.

Oct 3 2013:
If you never implement your decision you never know it's bad. And even it turns out a failure, if you can learn from it, it's also good. If you don't make any decision, it's also a decision that you've given up and let others decide your fate.

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